Haunted Essex

Haunted Essex gathers reported apparitions, manifestations and first-hand encounters from across the county, using historical and contemporary sources. Carmel King brings together familiar legends and lesser-known local accounts, treating Essex’s haunted heritage as a mixture of folklore, testimony and dark history.

The collection includes Robin the Woodcutter of Coggeshall, the story behind Thundersley’s Shrieking Boy’s Wood, and the grim activities of Matthew Hopkins, the seventeenth-century Witchfinder General. Other accounts involve witches, the Devil, spectral beasts and allegedly haunted halls, presenting a broad selection of ghost stories and supernatural traditions rooted in Essex places and their histories.